RS

MEMBER DIARY

Border Security at the Airport

Imagine you are in an airport security line. One of those long winding lines that snakes back and forth four or five times before you get to the TSA agents. You have your carry-on bag, identification and boarding pass ready to go. There is nothing to do but wait and hope they will open another station to check boarding passes a little faster. Maybe then you can get through the security scanner in time to grab something to eat on the way to your gate. Although it is annoying, you figure waiting in line is the price you pay for security in the post 9/11 world. The only comfort lies in the fact that everyone else has to go through the same ordeal to get to the terminal, all in the name of security.

Finally you make it through, gather your things from the bin at the x-ray station and pause to put on your shoes. Then from the other side you hear a commotion. A mob of people is flooding though the sliding glass doors from outside. It is men, women, and children of all ages, hundreds of them – many more than are standing in the long line in which you just waited for 40 minutes. They are moving toward the security checkpoints. The mob storms past the line and starts flooding though the security areas, climbing partitions and jumping over the baggage x-ray conveyor belts and gates. The TSA agents are helpless against such a surge of people. Many of those waiting in line, see an opportunity and come through with the mob who by now, have completely overwhelmed the checkpoint.

Seeing the crisis unfolding, the head of airport security sends additional TSA agents, not to secure the checkpoints, but to ensure the mob is provided with adequate food and drink. After all, most of them are only in search of jobs at the airport. Others just need a short flight to be close to loved ones. We really shouldn’t turn them away or punish them, right? Their only crime was to want to go the airport terminal to find a job or fly somewhere to find a better life for their family. Is airport security more important than our humanitarian sympathy for these people?

Fearing for their security, many of the would-be passengers who were in the terminal before the mob arrived chose not to get on their flight and left the airport. They did not have to board the plane or stay at the airport.

As the US Government refuses to secure the border with Mexico, American citizens don’t have the option our friends at this imaginary airport did. When the border in question is a national border instead of an airport security checkpoint, you can’t just go home to get away from it all. Our nation is our home. And this mob is real.